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by roguefaerie (samidha)



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Background "Calico" Jack Rackham, Developing Relationship, Exhibitionism, F/F, F/M, Fade to Black, Fandom Trumps Hate, Fandom Trumps Hate 2019, Feelings, Foursome, Gender Identity, Gender Issues, Genderbending, Happy Ending, Multi, Names, Nassau, Non-Monogamy, Polyamory, Polyamory Negotiations, Post-Canon, Relationship Negotiation, Returning Home, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-20
Updated: 2019-05-20
Packaged: 2020-03-07 08:12:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,872
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18869251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/samidha/pseuds/roguefaerie
Summary: Anne brings all of her people together by sailing home to Nassau despite everything, and her sailing partners need to find a new way to navigate on land. It may be complicated and messy in places, but they all love her and do their best.





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**Author's Note:**

  * For [keenquing](https://archiveofourown.org/users/keenquing/gifts).



> This fic is my first of two for FTH! It got away from me a little bit, as it took a bit to set up properly. I tried to address post-canon by developing Mary Read a bit with some gender ambiguity while sticking to what I know of how the courtship with Anne actually developed in history. It's intentionally a bit gender-wibbly-wobbly, and overall I hope it works! Much appreciation to my betas, who helped me round it out!
> 
> Relationship tags for this were a bit of a complicated mess, but hopefully it all works out in the end. (I learned some things about Assassin's Creed trying to tag this! This is not a crossover with Assassin's Creed.)

The seas had calmed, almost to the point of absurdity. For the pirates, trade was waning, and it had all come down to events at Nassau. Both what did and didn’t happen there.

Max had stayed, but she of course had her ways to get messages to those she needed to retain in her circle.

Max loved Anne in her own way, and even had a quiet fondness for Jack and the things they had accomplished, fleeting as they had been, on her island home. But so many of her interactions with people had been transactional that she remained tied to that particular land, still wielding the power that she could wrest for herself there.

*~*~*

Anne and Jack sailed with Read, who had come aboard with the sun shining down on their uniform, giving everything a golden sheen that Anne was taken with. Not currency, but the sheer glow of accomplishment and self-assurance she felt from Read. Almost immediately they would hover beside each other on the deck, talking long into the night. The secrets that Read divulged each night pulled Anne closer and closer in.

There was a way that they moved together across the ship as if two meant to join together in battle as equals. They were fluid and found communication flowed appropriately between them.

Jack saw this happening, but both of them knew they would never forget Max. She had laid the groundwork for so many things with them, including all of the things they learned about managing in a situation such as this.

Read spoke of gender quietly and in confidence, and Anne leaned down and offered her lips in a tender kiss of longing and recognition.

They were two doing their very best in a world not built for them and yet they saw a fierceness in each other and their mutual respect grew in every moment they spent together.

*~*~*

Though it was a curious endeavor to continue contact with the island of Nassau once things had settled into the new normal, they did make it work. There was very little that Anne and Jack couldn’t manage.

Understanding what was coming to be and secure in his own place in it, Jack stood slightly apart from them just when it was needed most. Space was given to the newly budding couple, all with an understanding that none would allow Max to be forgotten either. If things were to proceed as it seemed they were, then a trip back home to Nassau would be in the cards. All efforts would be undertaken to keep the group, Anne and Jack’s people, on the same page.

Shortly before the voyage to their home island, they sailed through twilight. Anne moved close to Read, brushing just slightly, and whispering, “Below?”

Their courtship was new, but Anne was no stranger to wishing for time with Read, a fierce pirate if ever there was one. Jack long knew better than to try to disallow it in any way. Sometimes he drank alone, but he was not unlikely to join them, even when all he did was enjoy being near.

“You’ve mentioned your gender, and I have noticed we fit together well,” Anne had said one day to Read. The words seemed awkward on Anne’s tongue that day, especially when compared to her usual obvious confidence. “Sometimes I wondered a thing or two. Wanted to tell you, if you want this, so do I.”

“It's a strange world. I’ve liked this, between you and me. I trust you. And as I’ve said, you may call me Mary or Mark.” And then the barest almost-shrug, but with some amount of embarrassment, “I have noticed some things as well. We’ve always had...a way with us.”

“Since the moment you came on board. But I know we all want to make sure we stay honest. There are some things. In my past,” Anne said, her words fast and clipped. “We always visit—ah—it’s in some ways our first home, and a woman there, we…”

“Are you...occupied?” Read asks in a flat tone, as if deliberately hiding any confusion.

“We have the freedom of the seas here. But on land, I still feel what’s in my heart. I need you to know that..”

“And you know I always honor mine. If Jack is still on board with it all, I know he was your first.”

Anne smiled knowingly. “Jack is, about anything that he knows would help me.”

“I only want to give you the same,” Read said. There was a slight hitch in the words for Anne to catch and hold, and decide what to do with. 

“That’s good. That’s really good,” Anne said, the decision made. Her voice was suddenly coarse. “Now? Before we set off for home?”

“Yes,” Read said, “Oh, most definitely.”

And so it began, and below decks there were two and sometimes all three of them, and if their pleasure was heard, it was respected by those of the ship.

*~*~*

In port at Nassau was perhaps, one would think, a bit more difficult to navigate. Max was tired, as if the battles both small and big had taken a lot out of her. And though she wasn’t waiting for Anne, she knew the content of Anne’s letters and she would still, with a certain nostalgia, take Anne to bed. There was a certain sadness to it, at times, two people in vastly different worlds brought together again and again like waves of the sea.

Jack tried to stay on the outside looking in, but he was always wishing to be where Anne was--watching and sometimes participating, in the end.

“It was beautiful, what we had, while we had it,” Max said once. “And perhaps again. Come with me. We will walk the beach together.”

She brushed her lips against Anne’s hair and whispered, “I see that the other has settled in with you.”

“Does it bother you?” Anne asked. “You’re not a kept woman and neither is Read.”

“I am happy that you are happy, my friend Anne. Perhaps you are happier than when we were in our closest time.”

“I wouldn’t say that.”

And Anne followed Max back to her room. Jack was long used to this, and allowed them their time, negotiated as it was out on the sands.

They knew all of the ways of each other’s bodies, and Max and Anne took turns. They all of the things that have come to pass between them into each touch. They each thought of the distance allowed by the sea, and they allowed for the emotions left over from what had come before in Nassau. Jack would at times enter into both their minds. But in this moment he kept a bit of distance, allowing them their room to mend or not mend what had been.

On the day that Read came ashore from the ship, she found them all easily. A few quiet “ahs” passed around the group. Drinks passed between them and at the end of the night Max offered Read a come hither look. 

Just before Max could take Read’s hand and head toward a bedroom, Read murmured, “There’s something that you may want—”

But perhaps Max was not ready to listen to the story of who Read really was, and the journey she had been on that was only partly tied to the sea. Still, in her own way Max would come to know and understand.

“Hey! Max. Just...be…” Anne said.

Max had every intention of being as attentive as the matter required.

*~*~*

“Just don’t say my name,” Read said, and Max smiled. It was not the first time she had gotten such a request. Quickly the situation became clearer.

“My dear...everything that you wish will be your experience here.”

Max knew exactly how to be the attentive but careful lover that Read needed. 

And then finally she asked Read if she wished for the others to be present.

“Can...can I?”

“Tonight...or another night, my dear.”

Read whispered, “Anne. Anne wanted to come back to you--to see you. And I won’t stand in her way. But I--”

“I will retrieve her,” Max said, determined. “And Jack?”

Read laughed. “I am sure you know he likes to listen. He can be wherever he wants to be. Whatever is all right with you.” And Read gave her a meaningful look.

“This is about you, my dear, but we will see, won’t we.”

Anne and Jack were some distance away but making sure to keep less distance between themselves and their new shipmate.

Max looked right at Anne and said, “Your presence has been requested by your new dear one.” 

Anne didn’t look altogether surprised. “And if it is...are you on or off the clock?” she asked, and it was not even the most frank she had ever been about these types of needs.

“Anne…” Max said. “We…”

“We’ll see, hm? After all, I’ll be there.”

“I believe that is the idea,” Max said. “Read has also said that Jack may listen, as is his desire.”

They shared a knowing look as they heard Jack offer a chuckle and settle himself nearby the door with no apologies. And then the two women went and joined Read in the adjoining room.

The night was long, as was the night after that. They all explored each other’s bodies more thoroughly than Read and Anne ever had on the ship. Still, the past had its own way of creeping into the room with them and offering its own quiet sadness. 

They sensed an uncharacteristic moment of nervousness from Anne before she admitted what was on her mind. “I would not leave either of you so easily. This is why we come home. To be where we’ve always felt right, and on equal footing. We look for ways to make things work. We always find a way.” 

Each of them knew this to be true, and Max let out a breath, “You did return to me.”

“We always will,” Anne said. “You’re always going to be one of us.”

Max allowed a smile. “We will say for now that I believe you. You have brought me someone lovely to enjoy as well.”

Beneath their gazes, Read shivered, arching toward them. They each took Read in their arms, allowing their bodies to become entangled with hers, and as Max and Anne finally relaxed into the moment it became one for all of them. 

The sea had brought one more into their fold, and with Anne as the fierce advocate for them all, trust finally settled in the room and allowed them to give voice to their every need. 

When they heard Jack’s breath rising and falling so clearly, they knew he was close to the door. Anne nodded and Max rose to open the way for him. He settled into the pile expertly with a murmured, “Thank you,” laced with want. 

Long into the night four voices rose and fell, bodies finding their rhythm.

It was Anne who brought each of them peaceful release then, all of them joined by the sea yet finding home that night on land as the tides turned.


End file.
